EU farmland issue worries Poland
By : Juliet D. Golden
All this could be yours: Laws on land ownership will change when Poland joins the EU.
In ongoing talks over European Union (EU) entry, negotiators are trying to determine when Warsaw will lift all barriers preventing EU citizens from buying agricultural land in Poland.
The right of non-Poles to buy agricultural real estate has emerged as one of the most potentially explosive issues in accession talks. For its part, the EU is fighting to win the right for its citizens to purchase land from Poland's first day in the trade bloc.
In its negotiation stance presented last year, Poland began pushing for an 18-year hiatus before it will have to lift any barriers to farmland purchases presently in place. With talks on the issue slated for completion by May, it should be clear by then who won out on this touchy point.
"There is nothing new on the issue right now," said Ewa Haczyk, spokeswoman for Poland's chief EU negotiator, Jan Kulakowski. "We are sticking by our stance for (a) transition period."
Central to Poland's request for the long hiatus are concerns that, given the low prices of domestic agricultural real estate, EU membership will allow EU citizens to rush in and buy up cheap land for speculative purposes.
For Jerzy Hendrich, director of Commercial Property Services, a Wroclaw-based property consultancy, the 18-year transition period allows time for land prices here to inch closer to those in the EU. But it will also give farmers a chance to gather funds to make their own land purchases and thereby enlarge their farms.
The price of land
"There is a very big gap between the price of land in Western Europe and in Poland," Hendrich said.
Presently, one hectare of arable land in Lower Silesia sells for zl. 5,000-zl. 7,000, well shy of the zl. 102,000-zl. 119,000 the same quality of farmland would cost in the Netherlands. "Arable land here is cheap," Hendrich said.
Real Estate experts and government officials also argue that the transition period will give Polish farmers a chance to gather funds needed to buy extra land so that they will be better able to compete with their EU counterparts.
"Purchasing power among farmers is very low here," said Jan Bielanski, director of the farmland office in the Agriculture Ministry. "If they have to compete (with Western Europeans), Polish farmers won't have a chance to get better pieces of land."
The average farm size in Poland is far smaller than those in the EU: 56% of all Polish farms are smaller than five hectares. The average-sized farm in the EU has 18 hectares, according to the Center for European Information (CIE).
"The structure of farming in Poland is not up to Western standards," Hendrich said. "So there are some serious reasons for asking for the transition period."
For many Poles, the sale of agricultural land to foreigners remains an emotional issue as well, especially among older farmers and in former German territories that now make up western Poland.
Keeping land private
In contrast to most soviet bloc countries, 70% of all farmland in communist Poland remained in private hands, despite attempts by the government to collectivize as much of the agriculture sector as possible, Hendrich said.
"For older farmers it is so important that farmland stays in private Polish hands," Hendrich said.
Many Poles in western Poland fear Germans returning to their former property and buying up their family possessions, leaving Poles with a tenuous claim to territories gained as a result of post-war settlements.
In public opinion surveys, Poles remain divided on the issue. According to polls carried out by CBOS, 16% surveyed said they are decidedly in favor of permitting foreigners to purchase land in Poland in exchange for granting Polish citizens similar rights in the EU, while 26% polled said that they were rather in favor of granting such rights.
On the other hand, 19% polled were decidedly opposed to granting foreigners full rights to purchase land, while 24% surveyed said that they were rather opposed to allowing purchases unimpeded.
